Fall Festival Costumes AKA Halloween Costumes

This is one costume I made for one of my granddaughters.  She wants to be a princess like her older sister.  The other dress is pink and I can't seem to pull it up my just saved pictures.  These dresses are polyester satin, tulle and a sparkly fabric.  They aren't hemmed yet so I need two little people to come over for a fitting.  Can't wait!

Tried again.  No picture of pink dress.  No pictures at all. 

A Poor Excuse

I have a wee bit of a cold so I'm going to use that as my excuse for not blogging for what? 6 weeks?  Longer?

I got frustrated weeks ago trying to down load a picture because posts are so much better with pictures.  It wouldn't download.  Even when I walked away and let the compute work/think for 15 minutes.  My IT person has been too busy to help me, boo hiss.  I'll see if I can find something for you to look at though.

In September, the two older granddaughters, their mother and I went to Hancock's Fabrics to pick out Halloween costume patterns and fabric.  The four year old wants to be a princess and her two year old sister is copying her.  We looked through the books and the four year old picked every princess dress there was.  Her mom suggester looking at them all THEN deciding on one.  A pattern was chosen and then we looked at fabric.  Four year old got pink and then told her sister what to pick.  The two year old agreed to everything.  She liked it all.  Mom took the four year old away and the two year old I an picked blue for her.  We got a shiny satin for the main body of the dresses, sparkly fabric for the sleeves and peplums and tulle for the over skirts.  Very fancy!  Good thing these girls are little so we didn't need much fabric!  The oldest did a nice job picking out matching thread. (How did she know we even needed thread??)

I traced the pattern in a size 3 and 4 then cut out fabric I already had to make practice dresses.  I wanted to make sure these fit since I haven't sewn dresses for them yet.  The oldest came over with her mom one day to try it on and it was a  perfect fit.  Over the next few days I threw together the practice dress for the younger.

I wanted to get these dresses to these girls ASAP because I wanted them to wear them to church and the weather would be getting cold soon and I needed to make sure the dress fit the younger.  I made arrangements to take the dresses up to their house which is inconveniently located in the Santa Cruz mountains.  I hate mountain roads.  I made it up the mountain only to get a block or two from their driveway and was stopped by  PG&E who was doing maintenance work.  I couldn't get through.  I was tweaked quite a bit by this turn of events.   I called my daughter and she said she would be me down the road a ways at a school.  She knew a back way that I wasn't about to try and do.  I knew I would get lost and then starve to death in the mountains only 20 feet from someones house because I didn't know where I was and how to get home.  SOOOOO pathetic.  But, I know my limitations.  

I think I'm rambling.  (It's the cold, I'm delirious)

So,  Halloween costumes are almost done.  It has been great fun sewing dresses for little girls again. 

Christmas is coming.  Aren't these great Christmas decorations?  This was in Massachusetts in the 60's.  I was 9 and my sister was 8.  Snow was a big change for us Californians.

Summer???

It doesn't feel like summer here in sunny California.  I live in San Jose and it has been the coldest summer in 40 years.  I heard that on the news last week.  Today at noon, DSH and I were being lazy (it being Saturday and all) sitting around playing on the computers in sweats!  Unheard of in mid August.

This is my mom and her twin sister.  Aren't they cute?  They made their outfits.  My aunt is on the left.  My mom,on the right, is the oldest.  Their birthday is August 1st, one of my cousins is also August 1st, a granddaughter of mine is the 4th, a cousin's son is the 5th, mine is the 6th, another granddaughter of mine is the 8th, my husband and my anniversary is the 8th, and the cousin who is the dad of the boy on the 5th  is the 9th.  Got all that?  The family always has a big August Birthday Bash.  My mom and aunt are the STARS OF THE SHOW because they are twins.   They are SPECIAL.  Am I bitter?, a little ;)  Anyway,  they turned 73 this year, they are hard of hearing, there were little people running around and the party was much more balanced.  I definitely enjoyed it more this year.  Maybe I'm maturing a little bit too!  It also helped that my cousin and his wife who hosted the party gave me her mother's Baby lock serger!!!  It is about 7 or 8 years old but not used because her mother passed away just after she bought it.    No one in the family wanted it so I got it.  I've been wanting a serger for a long time and I couldn't decide what to get.  Now, the problem is solved.  I will take it in for service since it has been sitting in their garage for the past 7 or 8 years.  Then I get to figure out how to use it.

I have more sewing pictures to show but DSSD has to put them in the computer as usual.  So, when that gets done I will post them.   

One of the "Fun" medical procedures

Today was my first colonoscopy.  Procedure:  not horrible, prep:  kind of horrible.  I didn't like the  not eating part.  By 5:00pm Thursday I was feeling very nauseated.  I ate jello (not red)  then I had to start drinking my eight glasses of "juice".  That wasn't as bad as it sounds.  It actually made me not feel hungry.  The last glass was hard to get down though.  No one needs any of the rest of the details.  Let's just say I got lots of hand sewing done in the bathroom (I know, that just sounds wrong!).  But, all is over, I've eaten (Thank you, Lord, for food!) and there were no finding of concern.  I don't have to do it again for 10 years.  Yay!  Now I am just resting.

I would much rather be at Happy Hollow Park riding the merry-go-round!

Enjoy your weekend!

One More

Thank you all for your nice comments.  Here is another project:

Here is a close up of my very first invisible zipper.  I was very happy with how it turned out.  This blouse had lots of problems.  It gaped a the neck so I put five pin tucks in which helped a lot.  It was supposed to have sleeves but I felt like I was in a straight jacket with the sleeves in so I took them out and cut them into bias strips and then bound the armholes with the strips.  That was the first time I had ever made bias strips.  That turned out pretty well.  I love the fabric.  It has tiny little flowers and vines that really do match the maroon skirt.  I think I over fit the top.  It doesn't really wear well.  The skirt is 100% polyester and feels very soft but doesn't hang or drape well so I'm not too thrilled with the whole project.  I learned a lot and the blouse fabric was only $2.50!  I got the end of the bolt.

It is funny what you see in pictures that you can't see in a mirror.  So many pull lines at the waist.  Sigh.

Sewing!

Here is one of my first projects.  It took me months to sew!  It is a pink and lavender tweed that ravelled terribly.  I had to zigzag each piece before I handled it too much.  I had to be very careful assembling the dress because I couldn't see the thread after it was sewn if I needed to rip it out!  I am happy with how it turned out.

This dress is brown and pink linen.  I like pink, mauve, raspberry, plum, etc!

This dress is a black and white polyester polka dot dress.  I made this because my husband likes polka dots.  It is a wrap around dress which is very different for me.  I made the front pieces overlap more than the pattern called for and I lengthened the dress three inches.  It is a silky type fabric and the tie wants to come undone.  Not good.  I think I will put a button and button hole where it meets under the tie!                       

My current project is a reprint of a 1960's dress.  I am making it out of rayon in a flowery print.

I hope you enjoyed the pictures!  It takes so long to get pictures downloaded in this house!

Nudged

A sweet comment by Judy at Apron Strings  has nudged me back to blogging.  Thanks, Judy!  I have been feeling much better which means I've been busy!  Work, sewing, family reunion, gardening, church, dog sitting for neighbors.  All the usual fun summer activities.  For Independence Day we went to the San Jose Giants baseball game and saw fireworks at the stadium afterword.  It was a great game and terrific fireworks.  They have an awesome BBQ before hand.  Great family fun.

I changed the way I do a few things at work which has helped my shoulder quite a bit.  I have finished some sewing projects and there are pictures but, of course, I depend on my DSSD to download them into my ancient computer and that hasn't happened yet.  The tomatoes are doing great but none are ripe yet, we've had a couple of meals with the green beans, tonight we had a zucchini, squash look terrible, onions are good and I keep picking the potatoes to early.

We went to Wasco, CA for a one day family reunion.  We drove down to Harris Ranch and spent the night there then continued on to my DSH's aunt's house for the big get together.  They have a huge farm so it is a big change for us city slickers.  His aunt sent us home with almonds, walnuts, old sewing patterns and books!